3 out of 5

Label: ROIR

Producer: Dub Trio, Marc Goodman (live engineer)

The pitch for Dub Trio sounds like something born between high school and college – beer-guzzling dudes who love dub (*cough* own a Bob Marley disc) and their Rage Against the Machine albums and have the brainstorm to mash the genres together.  At some point the idea evolves past simple mash-ups into original tunes, and the group gains some traction.  And then someone reads a book, and someone discovers jazz, and someone gets into electronics, and there’s an oddball nigh-major label release with a relatively significant amount of hype before the group starts on the forever-undelivered followup album, never really announcing that they’ve all drifted apart and gone on to regular lives.

Thankfully, that’s not really how Dub Trio shook out, and though at times the band does seem to just be falling back on generic dub touches to keep their moniker accurate, the decision to stay mostly instrumental and the focus on sweet Helmet-esque post-metal riffs instead of faux-metal has resulted in some solid releases – especially when paired with a label that encourages a dash of weirdness, i.e. Ipecac and ‘Another Sound is Dying.’  And some tracks from that album actually appear here, though the difference is notable.  Not exclusively because ‘Cool Out’ is live – the whole thing was recorded @ Union Pool – but because the live environment seems to have encouraged that college-rock vibe, resulting in slightly doofy and slightly sloppy musky riffing for most of the disc.  Encouraging this effect, the dub elements are even more disparate: some samples played during ‘interludes’ or in the build-ups before the head-banging begins; it’s just not as tight as the other albums.  Duh, because it’s live, but it doesn’t bring out the most enviable aspect of the band, in my opinion.

However, moving past this as a comparison, this still would’ve been a good show.  The band rocks together well, and interestingly, when they’re not trying to impress with all-out gusto, such as the laid back ‘dub’ tracks, the sound sticks out more.  But these are pauses in what’s otherwise a pretty noisy disc.  You’re tapping your toe during the show, definitely getting into it, but it’s a fairly average sound over all, so maybe you just get the t-shirt but not the CD.